Menu

At a rally in Wisconsin last week Donald Trump made an incredible claim about Hillary Clinton’s immigration proposals while clumsily trying to appeal to African-Americans.

“Now she’s proposing to print instant work permits for millions of illegal immigrants to come in and take everybody’s jobs, including low-income African-Americans,” Trump said to the gathered crowd. A cursory look reveals that pretty much this entire statement is false.

The Trump campaign refers to Clinton’s plan to fast track visas for foreign students that have graduated with high skilled degrees, promising to “staple” a visa to their Masters or PhD degree. This only applies to highly talented students that are in the US legally but would be sent back to their countries due to visa backlogs, not “millions of illegal immigrants.”

This only applies to graduates with a Masters or Doctorate degree in science, technology, engineering or math and thus would not be a threat to the “low-income” African Americans that Donald Trump is pandering to. “Everybody’s jobs” that they might be taking would be highly skilled position that the US desperately needs filled, and in many cases does not have enough native born applicants.

Hillary Clinton enjoys a 87% support rate among black voters. Trump has about 8%. That is a 79% advantage. Why would Clinton cook up a scheme to give African American jobs to illegal immigrants? It is unlikely that Hillary Clinton is going to alienate her strongest base in favor of a foreign minority that can’t vote.